China Waves Red Flag Over Web

Chinese consumers may now have to wait just as long to watch films and shows on the Internet, as they do to watch them in theaters or on television. That is, if Web and mobile companies try to follow Beijing's rules and the government cracks down on those that it thinks don't try hard enough.

Beijing is taking aim at much of the popular material found on the Web that would be forbidden from being screened or broadcast in the country's traditional media. The State Administration of Radio Film and Television (SARFT) said in a Web notice this week that all films, television series, cartoons and documentaries disseminated through the Internet or mobile phones must first be approved by Beijing's censors. Content involving religion, sex, violence, sensitive political issues, or perceived damage to national image, social harmony or interests--as always--could be banned or edited.

"SARFT is trying to apply the same standards and rules to the online world that they already applied to traditional media. They're trying to make the cyberspace and real life space more consistent in terms of what video is possible," said Rebecca MacKinnon, a media studies professor at University of Hong Kong who currently conducts research on Internet control.

That means a longer wait for Internet viewers, as approval for films and shows on Chinese theatres and television currently could take several months to over a year. The government also green-lights a very limited number of foreign films for domestic screening each year.

With this step, SARFT ventures further into a vastly more uncontrolled, and uncontrollable, territory, observers and researchers say. China's Internet portals, video-sharing sites and other Web and mobile operators will be expected to take down the content that hasn't been licensed by SARFT.

But video-sharing sites like Tudou.com, Youku.com and 56.com are already struggling to police the vast amounts of data posted by users. Most likely, the government and Internet players will have to meet in the middle. The site operators will endeavor to take down the most-trafficked films and shows unlicensed by the government so as to avoid drawing Beijing's ire and having their operating licenses suspended. SARFT will wield its control with the ebb and flow of the political climate.

"We'll see how tough SARFT is in enforcing this. I imagine it'll probably be selectively enforced. What you have is regulation on the books so that you can crack down when you want, rather than expecting that people will be 100% compliant," MacKinnon added. Indeed, the banned categories for audio-visual content are so "broad and subject to interpretation, but that's the point--to keep people guessing, so they err on the side of caution, and that's a good way to control people," she said.

Beijing is "trying to 'retake' the Internet," said Steven Dickinson, a Qingdao-based law partner at Harris Moure who has worked in Chinese law for three decades. "The government will pitch this as an attempt to clean up on intellectual property abuses. Frankly, there is some truth to that. However, I don't think it is the primary reason."

Beijing started requiring site operators to obtain Internet video broadcasting licenses last year (See "China Clamps Down On Internet Video"), and also cracked down on Web pornography early this year by blacklisting sites, from Baidu to Google (See "China's Own 'Yellow Peril' Is Online"). YouTube appeared to be briefly blocked this month, after video purportedly showing Chinese police brutality in Tibet circulated online.